


As My Memory Rests

by boasamishipper



Category: Top Gun (1986)
Genre: 1990s, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Relationship, Hospitals, Hurt/Comfort, Long-Term Relationship(s), M/M, Memory Loss, Post-Canon, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:55:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22312108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boasamishipper/pseuds/boasamishipper
Summary: In which a motorcycle accident has more consequences than just physical.
Relationships: Tom "Iceman" Kazansky/Pete "Maverick" Mitchell
Comments: 15
Kudos: 70





	As My Memory Rests

Maverick wakes up when the whole world is tilting, and there’s a lot of noise. Everything is a blur, slowly solidifying into shapes, into people. His head is throbbing; he can hardly think through the aching of literally every muscle in his body. What the hell happened? What’s going on?

“Sir, can you hear me? Can you hear me?”

“Yeah,” he manages, but it comes out like ‘ymph’. He blinks blearily up at the faces around him, feeling oddly like he’s missing something. Why are there so many people around him? “Wha’ happened?”

“You were in an accident, sir. Don’t worry, you’re going to be just fine; the paramedics are almost here.”

And then it all comes rushing back to him in a flash of sound and color so bright that it’s physically painful. Driving home from the Officers’ Club, Ice’s arms around him, going down an alternate route to avoid traffic, and that car coming out of nowhere—

He turns his head to the side, and his heart stops cold.

Ice is sprawled on his back about twenty feet away from him. The helmet he’d been wearing is now dented, spider-web cracks fanning out from the place where it must have struck the concrete. But worse yet is the fact that the left side of Ice’s face is covered in blood, and his eyes are closed, and he’s not moving. He’s completely still. Lifeless.

Maverick screams.

More people appear over him, talking to him, trying to get him to calm down, but he doesn’t give a damn — all he gives a damn about right now is getting to Ice. He scrambles into a sitting position and tries to force himself to his feet, but his legs aren’t cooperating with him, and he’s prepared to crawl the remaining distance when there are suddenly hands gripping his shoulders, an arm wrapping around his stomach, keeping him where he is. Keeping him away from Ice.

“No! No, let me go — _let go of me!_ Ice!” Panic has taken him in a vice grip and his throat is so tight that he can barely breathe. He’s thrashing, flailing in blind desperation, tears flooding his eyes. _“ICE!”_

“Sir, you have to calm down,” says one of the men holding him back, and it sounds so much like _Sir, you have to let him go_ that Maverick wants to scream again. This can’t be happening. This has to be a bad dream. Any second he’ll wake up at home, in bed, with Ice next to him grumbling about having been woken up in the middle of the night but still willing to help soothe Maverick’s nightmares away—

With strength he didn’t even know he had, he tears free of the hands holding him back and forces himself forward, landing next to Ice, who doesn’t even twitch. He’s bleeding, and he’s not moving, and Maverick feels himself break. “Ice?” He takes Ice’s hand in his, bringing it up to his mouth. His world is spinning and his vision is blurring and he feels like he’s going to throw up. “No. No, no, no, Ice, wake up. Wake up, Ice. Come on, you’ve gotta wake up, Ice, please! Don’t do this to me, Ice — _goddamn it Ice please don’t do this to me Jesus please no—”_

But no matter how many times Maverick says his name, no matter how hard Maverick shakes him or how loud Maverick screams, Ice does not wake up, and Maverick crumples over Ice’s chest, sobbing. There are more people around him and Ice now, and he can’t even find anything in him that cares. It’s just grief. It’s all just grief, a gaping hole tearing him open and tearing him apart.

“I’m so sorry,” he sobs. “God. God, Ice, I’m so sorry.”

Ice is dead. Ice is dead, he’s gone, and it’s all Maverick’s fault. He never should have suggested driving Ice home, never should have taken this route to begin with. He should have seen that goddamn car coming before it cost him the person he loved more than anything or anyone in the world.

“Sir, we’re going to have to ask you to move, we need to examine your friend here…”

Examine. What’s there for them to examine? All that means is that they’re going to take Ice away from him, and Maverick tightens his grip on Ice’s body, shaking his head fervently.

Ten seconds later, there are hands on him again, pulling him away from Ice, and Maverick is screaming and cursing in their grip, tears streaming down his face, because that’s it, he’s let go, and they’re going to take Ice away from him and Maverick will never see him again—

But the people around Ice aren’t interested in moving him, at least not yet. They’re talking to each other in low voices, their brows furrowed in concentration. One of them has her hand around Ice’s wrist, the other on his throat. She’s checking for a pulse, Maverick realizes, and he immediately goes still. He hadn’t thought of that. He’d just thought — _Jesus, please, if there’s still a chance—_

“—low, but it’s there; get the stretcher.”

It’s there. Ice has a pulse. Ice is alive.

The world suddenly has meaning again.

“Sir.” The woman is talking to him now, and he makes an effort to pay attention. Behind her, more paramedics are carefully taking the helmet off Ice’s head, checking his airway, checking for further injuries. He’s got a black eye, and his hair is matted with blood. “Sir, can you tell me what happened?”

Maverick forces a breath, and then another. “A car hit my motorcycle. I…we were driving home from a bar.”

“Did you or your friend have anything to drink?”

“Couple of beers. I wasn’t drunk.” In fact, he’s never felt more sober in his life. “Neither was he.”

“What’s your friend’s name?”

A lump rises in his throat. “Tom,” he manages. “His name’s Tom Kazansky.”

“And what’s your name?”

“Maverick.”

“Alright, Maverick, my name’s Julie. Would you mind following my finger, please?” She then spends the next couple of minutes examining him for injury, and aside from an impressive array of cuts and bruises and what appears to be a sprained ankle, he’d come out of the accident mostly unscathed. “Your friend’s suffered some pretty significant head trauma, and we’re going to take him to the hospital. Chances are when he wakes up he’s going to be dizzy, nauseous, probably have some memory loss, but we believe he’s going to be just fine.”

They’re lifting Ice onto a stretcher now, loading him into the ambulance. His helmet’s gone, and the left side of his face is all blood and skin scraped raw, and he’s still not moving. Maverick shudders. God, this is all his fault. “Yeah,” he whispers. “Yeah, I hope so.”

* * *

It’s ten o’clock by the time they get to the hospital, and nearly midnight by the time the doctors finish examining Maverick and let him sign himself out. His ankle should be fine in a couple of weeks, and the few cuts that needed stitching are all stitched up, which means all he’s got left to do is sit around and wait for one of the nurses to let him in to see Ice.

He’s been Ice’s emergency contact for the last year, but he still calls Ice’s parents and older sister to tell them what had happened, somehow managing not to burst into tears at the thought of Ice lying there broken and lifeless because of Maverick’s carelessness. But he’s not dead. He can’t be dead. He’s not allowed to die like this.

If he tells himself that enough, maybe he’ll believe it.

Finally, around one o’clock in the morning when Maverick’s started to doze off in one of the waiting room’s uncomfortable plastic chairs, he hears somebody say, “Family of Thomas Kazansky?”

Maverick sits up so fast that his back cracks and his neck twinges in pain. When he gets home, he’s going to take three Advil and a hot shower and pass out for the next week. “I’m his emergency contact,” he says, standing up and walking towards the doctor as best as he can, trying to keep weight off his sprained ankle. One of the nurses had offered him a crutch, but he’d refused. None of his pain matters right now. “Is he okay?”

The doctor hesitates, and that’s how Maverick knows whatever she’s about to say cannot be good. “He’s not awake yet,” she says. “But he should be coming around within the next hour or so. You’re welcome to sit with him until then.”

Maverick nods. His mouth is too dry to speak, so that’s all he can do. 

He follows the doctor down the hall, his fists clenched at his sides as he tries to breathe like a normal person who isn’t terrified out of his wits. He hates hospitals. He spent an entire year in one watching his mother wither away and die of cancer, and woke up in one alone after Goose had died. And now Ice is in the hospital because of him, and—

_No. Don’t think like that. It’s going to be fine._

Before he knows it, they’re at Ice’s room, and the doctor lets him in, saying something about pressing the call button ‘when Mr. Kazansky wakes up.’ Maverick’s glad Ice isn’t around to hear her call him anything other than Lieutenant Commander Kazansky, and he just nods, bracing himself as he goes in.

Maverick looks up just as the door shuts behind him, and his heart stops cold.

Ice is awake. There’s a bandage wrapped around his head, and the left side of his face is raw and bloody and bruised, and he looks like he hasn’t slept in the last two days, but he’s sitting up, and he’s looking at Maverick, and he’s _awake_. He’s alive.

“Hi,” Ice says. His voice is hoarse but clear and it’s the best thing Maverick has heard all day.

Maverick surges forward to kiss Ice, so relieved that he might actually faint or burst into tears or both, but Ice pulls back before Maverick even gets close.

“What’re you doing?”

“It’s okay,” Maverick says, figuring Ice must still be confused from the accident. “It’s okay, we’re alone.” He leans forward again, but this time Ice’s hands come up and shove him backward with more strength than he’d expected, and he sits down hard in the nearest chair, stunned and a little angry. “Jesus! What’s your problem?”

“My problem?” Ice repeats incredulously, like Maverick is the idiot here. “You were going to kiss me!”

Maverick is completely at a loss. “Since when do you have a problem with that?”

Ice’s face goes red. “Since when — what the hell are you talking about? I don’t even know you!”

It’s not just terror that corkscrews through him, but a _hurt_ that takes his breath away. “Yes you do,” he says. He forces a laugh but it falters halfway through either from lack of air or fear. “Don’t fuck around, Ice. It’s me. Maverick.”

Nothing. Not even a flicker of recognition.

“Ice.” His voice breaks again. “Ice, come on. You’ve gotta know me.” He moves to take Ice’s hand, but Ice retracts it before Maverick can touch him. This has to be a nightmare. This hurts too much to be real. “You couldn’t have hit your head that hard. Ice, it’s me.”

“Why do you keep calling me that?”

All the air leaves Maverick’s lungs at once, leaving him lightheaded and unsteady and terrified all the way down to his bones. Ice isn’t kidding. Ice doesn’t know his own name, and he doesn’t know who Maverick is, and that means Ice doesn’t remember what they are to each other, and—

Maverick manages to make it out of the room and halfway down the hall before he throws up all over the floor.

* * *

The next few hours filter by as a series of disconnected details.

Tests. Test results. Serious-looking doctors. Quiet explanations. Voices outside Ice’s room. The clock ticking on the wall. Phone calls. A sympathetic squeeze of Maverick’s shoulder.

Someone is screaming. Maverick figures out after a while that it’s him, silently, in his own head.

* * *

“But how did this _happen?”_

At the quiet, desperate plea in Jess Kazansky’s voice, Maverick makes himself look up. His movements are slow, like he’s swimming up from the bottom of a deep pool with weights tied to his ankles, and stiff. Someone — probably the same nurse that had found him on his knees in the hallway, hyperventilating and dry-heaving — had wrapped a blanket around his shoulders; it’s bright orange and scratchy and the only thing keeping him from having another panic attack in the middle of the hospital waiting room. Jess and Bill and Taylor had asked him for answers that he couldn’t give them — not just because he doesn’t know, but because he physically can’t make himself speak — so they’d turned to the doctor instead.

“It’s rare,” the doctor says, sounding sympathetic. Do all doctors get trained to talk that way in medical school? “Rare, but not impossible for victims of a severe head injury to experience retrograde amnesia. Sometimes it can last for a few minutes, an hour — and in your son’s case, Colonel Kazansky, much longer. Sometimes a few days, a week. Maybe longer.”

“But it isn’t permanent,” Taylor says. Unsteady, scared, which isn’t how Taylor Kazansky has ever sounded. She’s Ice’s older sister, brave and confident about everything, always teasing Ice and ruffling his hair and calling him Tommy. She loves her younger brother more than anything, and seeing Ice the way he is now might kill her. Kill her the way it killed Maverick when Ice looked at him with nothing in his eyes and said, _I don’t even know you._ “It’s not, right?”

The doctor hesitates, and Maverick buries his face in his hands, breathing deep. God. Permanent. Jesus. “Each case varies,” she says, “but based on the extent of his head injury, and the lack of problems with his reflexes and balance and sensory function, I don’t see why it would last more than a week. Once the swelling goes down, of course.”

Jess inhales sharply, and Bill puts a hand on his wife’s shoulder like he might collapse without the support. His voice, when he speaks, is shaky, tear-thick. “Can we see him?”

The doctor shows Jess and Bill to Ice’s room, leaving Maverick alone with Taylor in the waiting room. Taylor slumps forward in the plastic chair beside Maverick, breathing deep. “How are you holding up?”

A laugh startles out of him. “Fine,” he says hoarsely. It’s not even a lie; compared to Ice, he might as well be in perfect health. _Permanent._ Just the word makes his hands tremble. “I’m so sorry, Taylor.”

“It’s not your fault, Maverick,” Taylor says, automatic, and maybe even like she means it. But she hasn’t seen Ice yet. She won’t be so quick to support him once she sees what his carelessness had done to her brother. And he can’t be around when that happens. Can’t stay in this antiseptic-smelling room any longer than he has to.

“I should go home.” He forces himself to his feet, ignoring the stab of pain coming from — well, basically everywhere. “I’ve…I can’t, I…I need to get some sleep.”

It’s a pathetic excuse — especially since tomorrow is Sunday and he doesn’t even have work — but Taylor doesn’t call him out on it. “Do you want me to drive you?”

He wants to refuse, but his motorcycle’s wrecked and he doesn’t have any other way of getting home. “Yeah. Thanks.”

Maverick doesn’t speak during the twenty minute ride to his house, and Taylor doesn’t force him. The only sound in the car is the clicking of the turn signal, and the muted hum of the music coming from the cassette player. He tries concentrating on that until he realizes it’s The Doors, Ice’s favorite band, and then he spends the rest of the ride staring at his knees and clutching the blanket in a white-knuckled grip, sweat and orange fuzz sticking to his hands.

He goes into his kitchen first, pouring himself a glass of water that he knows he won’t have the energy to drink. Everything is abnormally quiet; even the rumbling of the pipes and the ticking of the clock in his living room are strangely muted. He’s still got the blanket in his hands, and he smooths it out on his lap, folding it as small as he can before unfolding it and starting again.

He knows he should go to bed — it’s gotta be after four in the morning by now — but he’s not even tired, despite his pain and exhaustion insisting otherwise. He can’t sleep here. He doesn’t sleep here half the time anyway; in fact, he doesn’t even remember the last time he was here for longer than it took to shower, or pick up a change of clothes. This isn’t his home, he can’t be here, he doesn’t know how to be here alone, because that’s what he is now, alone now that Ice is— 

There are shards of glass on the floor, and he stares at the mess with numb shock. He doesn’t remember throwing anything. Doesn’t remember getting to his feet at all. But here he is, and there’s a broken glass on the floor, and he’s moving away from the mess, out of the house and down the street. He’s not in control of his own body, he has no idea where he’s going as long as it’s _somewhere,_ and yet, he isn’t at all surprised when he comes to a stop on Ice’s front lawn. _There,_ his body seems to say, like he’s a moth being drawn to a flame. _Home._

Maverick lets himself in with the spare key Ice gave him months ago, and follows the well-treaded path to the bedroom. It’s clean, everything in its proper place. The bed is made neatly, because that’s what Navy officers do if they care about regulations, _Maverick._ His movements are slow, robotic, as he strips, folds his clothes neatly and leaves them on top of the dresser, leaving his shoes by the door. He’s got spare clothes here, but it’s Ice’s shirts he goes for first, taking a gray one with _USNA_ written on it in fading white letters. He sits down on the bed in nothing but his boxers, and pulls the shirt over his head. It’s big on him. Ice would probably get a kick out of that if he was here.

He crawls under the covers, settling on Ice’s side. The blankets are warm and Ice’s pillow smells like _Ice,_ and Maverick closes his eyes, trying to pretend this is a normal night. That they’ve just gotten back from the O Club, and he’s waiting for Ice to get out of the shower and join him in bed. Waiting for Ice to kiss him, to wrap an arm around Maverick’s stomach and hold him close, to let Ice’s steady breathing lull him to sleep.

But Ice isn’t here. Ice is in the hospital, and he doesn’t know who he is. Doesn’t know who Maverick is. _Rare. Permanent. What are you doing, why do you keep calling me that, I don’t even_ know _you—_

Huge, wracking sobs shake his body, leaving him wrung out and choking for air, and he brings Ice’s pillow to his chest, clutching it like a lifeline in a storm. A noise that’s half wail, half keen escapes him, giving voice to his despair, his grief, his guilt — and eventually carrying him into unconsciousness.

* * *

By Monday, news of Ice’s condition has spread through TOPGUN like the plague, and Maverick ignores all of the whispers and rumors and questions from the students and instructors alike. He’s grounded until his ankle and the rest of his injuries heal, so he spends the entire day in his office doing his and Ice’s paperwork to the best of his ability, concentrating on every tiny detail. He needs to concentrate on _something_ or he’ll break down completely.

“Maverick.”

Maverick’s not surprised to see Viper in his office; in fact, he’s surprised Viper hadn’t come by sooner. “Sir.”

“How’re you holding up?”

He manages a shrug, a wry smile. “Been better.”

“I bet,” Viper says, and whatever he’s really thinking, he keeps it on lockdown. “I went to see Kazansky this morning.”

Maverick stiffens, daring to hope. “How is he?”

“He thought I might be his uncle,” Viper says, and Maverick’s shoulders slump. Right. Stupid of him to hope that everything would go back to normal after just one day. “Seemed a little groggy, but better than I expected.” _Right,_ Maverick thinks bitterly. _Aside from the whole amnesia thing._ “His family’s still there. They want to know if you’re coming by to see him today.”

“I, uh…” He bites his lip. “I…I have to…I can’t. My bike’s totaled.”

“I’ll drive you,” Viper says, his tone brooking no argument. “It’s on my way home. And he’ll be happy to see you.”

Maverick lets out a breath. “Alright,” he finally says. If it’s a choice between seeing Ice and going home and staring at nothing until he falls asleep, he’ll take Ice every time. “Thank you, sir.”

* * *

Jess and Bill aren’t there, but Taylor is, and she greets him with a hug (not too tight, for which he’s grateful) and a relieved smile. “I’m glad you’re here,” she says, like it’s been a hundred years since they’ve last seen each other. “Go on in; I’ll be back in five, I just need to make a call.”

Maverick tells her to take all the time she needs — even though part of him really wants to wait for backup before going into Ice’s room — and once she’s gone, he stands in front of Ice’s door for several seconds, trying to catch his breath. He at least knows what he’s going into this time. No surprises. He can do this. This is _Ice._

But it isn’t. Not really. And he’s immediately reminded of that when he walks into the room and Ice’s eyes lock on him. Missile lock imminent. It’s the same cool, assessing gaze from the O Club all those years ago, but there’s a new wariness behind it, like he has no idea what he’s seeing. Like he’s expecting Maverick to lunge across the room and attack him. Based on their last interaction, Maverick doesn’t blame Ice for the suspicion.

“Hi,” he says. Awkward. Uncomfortable. “I’m—”

“Maverick.”

His heart jumps into his throat, choking him. “You…you know me?”

“You’re hard to forget,” Ice says wryly, and it’s the _same,_ it’s _Ice,_ it’s— “You tried to jump me when I woke up.” 

Maverick’s heart takes a running leap out of his chest and flings itself out the window into oncoming traffic. “Right.” His mouth is very dry, and he drops his eyes to the floor. “I…right. I meant to say that…that I’m sorry for that.”

“Why did you do it?”

He makes himself shrug. “Just a joke,” he manages. “Between friends.”

“Is that what we are?”

Maverick looks up again. Ice’s head is cocked slightly to the side; he’s sizing Maverick up, and from the looks of it, he’s not impressed with what he sees. Maverick can’t see any trace of the man who told him on the USS _Enterprise_ that Maverick could be his wingman anytime. Who sings The Doors in the shower and twirls his pen over his fingers when he’s concentrating and went to see _Pretty Woman_ in theaters three times and cried during every showing. Who always has Maverick’s back, in the air and on the ground. That man isn’t there. “Yeah,” he says. Somehow, his voice doesn’t break. “Yeah, that’s what we are.”

Ice doesn’t look convinced. “How did we meet?”

“We were at TOPGUN together.”

“Top what?”

“TOPGUN,” Maverick says. “United States Navy Fighter Weapons School. Fighter and strike tactics training for the top one percent of naval aviators. You won the competition; you were Top Gun. We both teach there now. Do you…remember any of that?”

“No,” Ice says. “I don’t think so.” His voice is quiet and his eyes drop to his lap, and Maverick wants to reach out, to touch him, to reassure him so badly that it physically hurts to keep his distance, but he stays where he is. “You called me Ice yesterday. Nobody else has called me that.”

“It’s your callsign,” Maverick says. “Your…pilot nickname, I guess. Iceman. Ice.”

“And you’re Maverick.”

“Yeah.”

Ice looks up at him again, and even with him in the bed and the skin on the left side of his face scraped raw and bandages wrapped around his forehead, he still seems to loom over Maverick. “The doctors said you were brought in with me,” he says. “Looks like you got the better end of the deal.”

Heat rushes to Maverick’s face. “Looks can be deceiving,” he says, trying for some levity even though his throat is so tight he almost can’t speak at all. “My bike’s in worse shape than both of us. Completely totaled.”

“Your bike?”

“My motorcycle.”

“Your motorcycle,” Ice repeats, and Maverick has just enough time to think _oh shit_ before Ice says, “So _you’re_ the one who’s responsible for what happened to me?”

The words cut Maverick right to the core, and he stumbles back like he’s been dealt a physical blow. That’s it, then. That’s how Ice knows him now, just as the stranger whose actions landed him in the hospital. Nothing else matters. Nothing about Maverick matters. Tears fill his eyes. 

“Hey,” Ice is saying, his hands held out in front of him like he’s trying to soothe a spooked horse, “hey, wait — Maverick, listen, I didn’t mean,” but Maverick is out of the room before he hears what it is that Ice didn’t mean — and before Ice can see him cry.

* * *

“Should have figured you’d be here,” Taylor says.

Maverick blinks stupidly at her. Part of him is still half asleep, and another part has no idea what to do with the fact that he’s standing in front of Ice’s sister, in Ice’s kitchen, wearing nothing but Ice’s shirt and a pair of boxers. The rest of him is still stuck somewhere between _I don’t even know you_ and _so you’re the one who’s responsible for what happened to me,_ and doesn’t care about much else. “How did you get in here?”

“Tommy keeps a spare key under the doormat,” Taylor says. “Is that how you got in?”

“He gave me a key.” The words come out in an embarrassed mumble, and he moves past Taylor to the coffeemaker, his face flushed. “Why were you looking for me?”

“Why?” Taylor repeats. Her voice is dangerously soft, and it makes Maverick glad that his back is to her. “Because my brother loves you, and you haven’t come to see him in five days.”

“Don’t say that to me,” Maverick says. He hasn’t slept much since the accident — though he hated calling it that — and every time he closes his eyes, he sees Ice lying lifeless and bloody by the side of the road, or in the hospital sizing him up, no fondness or warmth in his expression. He’s not sure which is worse. He turns around and jabs a finger at her. “Don’t you dare stand there and accuse me of not loving him, Taylor. You know I love him.”

“Then start acting like it,” Taylor snaps. She’s taller than him — taller than Ice too, by five inches — and her narrowed eyes and tight jaw are enough to cow him into shutting up. “Why haven’t you come to see him?”

“He doesn’t want to see me.” He can feel his throat closing up from the threat of impending tears, and he digs his nails into the palms of his hands, forcing himself to get it together. A week of nearly nonstop crying should have dried him out by now. “He doesn’t…Ice doesn’t know me anymore.” _He doesn’t love me anymore,_ he wants to say, but he’s disgusted by his own melodrama and keeps that to himself.

“He knows you.”

He has to grab the counter to keep his balance. “What?”

“Tommy told me he didn’t mean what he said to you,” Taylor says. Maverick hangs on her every word. “That he doesn’t blame you for what happened. He wanted to say that to you in person, but you didn’t show up again and I couldn’t get in touch with you.”

“Ice…” Maverick swallows. He feels like he can’t get enough air. “Ice said that?”

“Yeah,” Taylor says. “He did.” She scrubs a hand down her face, looking like she’s aged twenty years in the span of a second. “Maverick. I know you feel guilty, and I know this…that this has been just as hard for you as it has for me. But you’ve been hiding out here in Tommy’s house acting like…like he’s dead, or something. And if your positions were reversed — if you were in the hospital and you couldn’t remember who you were, or…” She falters. “If you couldn’t remember him, is this how he’d be treating you?”

No. It isn’t. It isn’t how Ice would be treating him at all. He’d be there for Maverick if the scenario was reversed, not shutting him out, not abandoning him. He wants to laugh, even if nothing about this is funny. Some wingman Maverick has turned out to be.

“You love him,” Taylor says. “I know you do. So start acting like it.”

* * *

Jess and Bill are in Ice’s room when he and Taylor arrive, and for a second, all Maverick can do is stare. Ice is awake. The bandage around his head is gone, and so are most of the bruises and scrapes from the accident are healing nicely. And when he looks up and meets Maverick’s gaze, his expression softens into something familiar. Relief. Recognition. “Hey.”

“Hi.” Maverick shifts from foot to foot. “Hi, Ice.”

“We’ll give you a minute alone,” Bill says, and he and Jess rise, following Taylor to the door. Jess kisses Ice on the temple, and Maverick hears words pass between them, like _fine_ and _Mom._ Mom. So Ice remembers Jess. That’s good. Good. And he probably remembers Bill too, and Taylor. Just not Maverick yet. Or maybe ever.

The door closes behind them, and Ice says, “You didn’t come back.”

“I know,” Maverick says. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“No,” Ice says. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…what I said to you, I didn’t mean it like that. I wasn’t…” His voice trails off. Maverick thinks back to the last time he saw Ice like this: in the locker room, after Goose’s death when he’d contemplated quitting. Ice had been awkward then too, when he’d tried to offer Maverick comfort. _Some things never change, I guess._ “I don’t blame you. The accident, it wasn’t your fault.” 

“Did Taylor tell you to say that?”

It’s a terrible thing to say, and Maverick’s on the verge of taking it back and begging for forgiveness when Ice snorts. “No,” he says. “Funny enough, getting hit on the head didn’t make me an asshole. I can still figure out when I said something wrong, or hurtful. Particularly when the person I said it to runs out of the room in tears.” He stops, takes a breath. “Particularly when it’s you.”

“What do you mean, when it’s me?” 

“I remember you,” Ice says. Then, so softly Maverick almost misses it altogether, “I remember you, Mav.”

One second he’s fine, if still a little on edge, and the next he feels like he’s in a jetwash, crumbling away, in a flat spin heading out to sea. He can hear nothing but his heartbeat in his ears, the sound of his ragged breathing. And those four words — _I remember you, Mav_ — ricocheting in his head like a bullet in a metal box. _Mav._ Through numb lips, he forces out the words, “What do you remember about me?”

“That you’re my wingman,” Ice says, and Maverick’s entire world stops. Or maybe it starts again, because he can feel warmth spiraling outward from his chest and spreading through his whole body, warming everything that had gone cold and numb since the accident. Because Ice said wingman, and from the look in his eyes, he knows the double meaning. Remembers that in the early days of their relationship, Ice had said something about boyfriend being a juvenile term, so Maverick started calling Ice his wingman instead. _Wingman. Mav._ He does remember.

On unsteady legs, Maverick crosses the room. Kneels by Ice’s bed. Reaches out with a shaking hand to touch Ice’s face. And Ice lets him.

Maverick bursts into tears.

“Mav,” Ice says, “Mav, hey, it’s okay,” but Maverick throws his arms around Ice and clings the best he can with Ice half horizontal in the bed. Ice embraces him, whispering something, rubbing Maverick’s back, which is shaking from the weight of his tears. He’s cried a year’s worth of tears in the last week, and now he’s crying again and he doesn’t care. Ice remembers him again.

“I’m so sorry,” he sobs. He’s crying so hard he can barely breathe, and only Ice’s arms around him keep him from breaking down beyond repair. “I love you, I love you so much, God, Ice, I’m so sorry—”

“Hey. Shh, baby, it’s okay. It’s okay. I’m here. I’m right here.”

“You forgot me. You forgot me, Ice.”

“And I remembered you again,” Ice says. “I was always going to remember you, Mav. I could never forget you for good. I’m sorry it took me so long.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too. It’s going to be okay. I’m going to be okay. Look at me.”

Sniffling, Maverick pulls back, just enough that he can still see Ice and still be in his arms. Ice touches Maverick’s cheek, his hand grazing Maverick’s jaw, and Maverick drinks in the sight of him. Bruised, scarred, but still alive. 

“I hope you know,” Ice says, “that I’m driving us home from the O Club from now on.”

Laughter bubbles up in his throat and spills out of him, shaking his shoulders as he buries his face in the crook of Ice’s neck again. It hadn’t even been that funny, but it feels so good to laugh knowing that everything is okay again. That his world is back on its axis, because Ice is okay. “You can drive us to work, too,” he says, once his laughter has mostly abated into the occasional hiccough. “My bike’s totaled.”

“I remember,” Ice says, and no words had ever sounded so good. He pokes Maverick in the shoulder, and Maverick looks up at him again. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Then, amending at the disbelief on Ice’s face, “I sprained my ankle. I’ve got road rash on my back and my ass and my shoulder, but I’m okay.”

“Huh,” Ice says. “Well, in that case, I’m okay too.” He gestures at his face with his free hand. “Though my doctor says I’m going to end up with some killer scars.”

“Scars are hot,” Maverick says, grinning. “They’ll give you character.”

“Maybe you should get some for yourself. You could use some character.”

“I’m already a character.”

“Yeah,” Ice says, smiling a little, and Maverick feels the last of his tension melt away for good. “Yeah, that’s for sure.”

Maverick leans in to kiss Ice, but falters before he can get too close. “Not going to push me away, are you?”

Ice’s lips twitch into a familiar grin. “Come find out.”

(He doesn’t get pushed away.)


End file.
